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“What?” I snap. I was trying to think.
“Can you give me an update?”
I exhale through my teeth and tell the operator, “The seizure stopped. He opened his eyes before.”
“And now?”
“Closed.”
“Okay,” she updates the report because all I hear is her keyboard. “Can you see the blood? How does it look?”
“It looks like a horror movie,” I offer as I stare at the cloth in my hand. It doesn’t have much blood. “I think the bleeding slowed down a bit, or maybe all his blood is on the asphalt.”
I hang my head. I’m not going to be able to save this guy.
“Neve, do you hear the sirens? Emergency personnel are almost there.”
Other than the sound of a racing heart in my ears, I hear nothing.
Perdition
NEVE
Sirens sound off in the distance, two different kinds. The guy beneath me twitches, but he doesn’t wake up again. Doesn’t puke again. Doesn’t breathe much again.
“Hey,” I call out to Styx, my elbows shaking as I release one hand from the wound to smack his cheek softly. Sweat transfers from his clammy skin to my fingers.
Gross.There’s so much of this guy’s bodily fluids on me, I don’t even dwell on the hundreds of diseases buzzing to the surface of my mind, like a wack-a-doo’s version of Family Feud.
Survey says... I need to bathe in bleach. Maybe down a bottle of homemade moonshine to disinfect the inside andkill the microbes, or like the a.m.’ers around my job call it, Matar o Bicho.
To check Styx’s airway, I open his mouth by shoving a finger down his throat. Clear, but no gag reflex.
This gets worse and worse by the second.
“Letting my boss’s son die is a real shitty thing to do,” I whisper in his ear so the dispatcher can’t hear. “I’m sorry I didn’t open the door. Your mom gave me a roof over my head and food when I had nowhere else to go,” I tell him in case I won’t have the chance to do it later.
One-sided, death bed confessions require a muted phone.
“I was sleeping under this very crawlway, and she took pity on me. Helped me through the mess I was in, and taught me how to cling to hope. God, it was infectious. Most of the times, annoying, but I miss the way she buzzed around in love with life.”
A quick glance at the phone, to double-check that I had turned on the muted button, fills my head with scenes of the worst moment in my life. One, I haven’t been able to speak about yet.
“Find the positives, Neve.” I smile at the memory even though it strikes a bittersweet chord. “That’s what she’d say to me every time I wanted to give up.” I rub my cheek against my shoulder to wipe away a stray tear — the only one I’m going to allow myself. “If you make it out of this, maybe one day I can tell you how much your mother means to me... And how much of a dick you are, and a damn coward, if I’m being honest.”
The words hit my brain for processing a moment later, and though true, guilt forces me to blurt out, “But you can’t be a coward now!”
My eyes fix on his eyelids. I’m practically rambling to a dead person, but maybe he’s listening. Maybe he needs someone to believe in him just a little.
I’m not sure that’s me, but I feel obligated. Not that he knows, but this face has been in my mind for years, doing ungodly and godly things to me — I owe him. If there’s a two percent chance he’ll make it, then that’s the two percent I’m talking to.
“You have to make it through for your mother because she needs you. She needs to feel your hand in hers and know that she’s not alone.” I slide one of my hands down to his and squeeze tight. “Mama Rosa doesn’t have hate in her heart, and that’s what makes her so amazing — so peaceful. So bright.”
Maybe that’s why it feels so dark without her.
“You’re going to get through this...” I don’t want him to think of me as a liar, so I tack on, “...hopefully. But I still have no idea why you were stupid enough to come back.”
I don’t even know him — in reality — and there’s already a lump in my throat. I’m angry at myself for not being able to save him, for not helping him, for not knowing enough to keep this guy alive. And I’m angry at him for coming here and putting himself at risk.
